The Years
by Pickwick12
Summary: Three months after the death of Rooster Cogburn, Miss Mattie Ross is pleased to receive a letter from her other old friend, Mr. LaBoeuf. Three chapters tell the story of what happened to Mattie and LaBoeuf after the end of the film. Reviews rock.
1. Miss Mattie Ross

I heard from Mr. LaBoeuf three months after I visited the grave of Rooster Cogburn, the man who carried me to safety with rattlesnake poison coursing through my veins. I had not thought to ever hear from the Ranger again, especially after finding Cogburn dead and buried, but I did not think the idea distasteful.

I was churning butter in the kitchen of my farm when the young boy, Angus Murphy, brought the letter. He was a bright child, not as given to prattling and immoderately high spirits as the rest of his six siblings, and I did not mind his company.

"Miss Mattie?" His blond head just peeked over the kitchen table, forming a comical picture, were I given to amusement, which I am not.

"State your business, young Angus," I said, slightly red from the exertion of churning.

"A letter's come for you, and my Ma told me to bring it over." The child's mother was the postmistress, a job she did not do well, but the town tolerated her on account of her being a widow with a large family.

I tool the parcel from the boy. It was slightly larger than a normal letter. "It's all the way from Texas, ma'am!" The child looked as if he might bounce like an India Rubber Ball.

"I can read that for myself, young Angus," I said, thought not as sharply as I might. I gave him a particular look, and he scampered away across the fields. I allowed myself an almost indulgent smile before carefully opening the letter, which had no name on the outside but was marked with a sender's address of San Antonio, Texas. The letter itself was written on plain white paper.

_Dear Miss Ross,_

_ I do not know if you will have retained the name with which I address you, though I have a certain suspicion that you may have done so. By making this observation, I do not mean to denigrate either your person or your character, for I know for a fact that you have been an exemplary and most determined woman from the age of fourteen years, and one not without attractions, though I did not comment upon them during our prior acquaintance._

_ The reason I have chosen to write to you after so long an interval is that it has recently come to my attention that our mutual acquaintance, Mr. Rooster Cogburn, US Marshall, has gone to his final rest. Knowing you as I do, I thought that you would like to know. _

_ I do not think you will be averse to hearing a short account of my own life. I was a Ranger for many years, both feared by the lawless and praised by the righteous, of which I am, I believe, justifiably proud. I was married for six months in the year that would have contained your eighteenth birthday. My wife passed away while birthing our daughter Lizzie, who also died. _

_ The years have not taken the missing from me, but they have taken my youth. I am an old man now, Mattie Ross. I know that you are a woman now, grown and approaching age yourself, but I confess that I cannot picture you so. I ever remember you as the small, determined person who did not bear me ill-will for a beating and fought harder than any officer with whom I have since served. _

_ I do not expect a response from you, though if you wish to return one, I will receive it with pleasure and read it with satisfaction._

_Yours,_

_LaBoeuf_

I read the letter over three times, noting the inelegant handwriting that nonetheless articulated a certain elegant economy of phrase. Mr. LaBoeuf had not changed. He was still the unassuming gentleman of my recollections.

I put the paper aside and began to form a cake of cornbread, satisfied that my own predictions had come true. I'd often imagined the futures of both Marshall Cogburn and Mr. LaBoeuf, though the Marshall's had always been somewhat vague in my mind; Mr. LaBoeuf, on the other hand, my imagination had always showered with quiet honors of the sort he had apparently attained.

I let myself ponder his sadness for a moment. Like me, he was not given to a great deal of mirth, but even so, no man deserves such a grief. I wondered that he had not married again, for my mind recalled him as a pleasant-looking man with passable manners as long as he wasn't after one with a switch. Perhaps, like me, he had not found the time.

I thought I ought to send a response, but as is my usual practice, I ate dinner and read a chapter of the Psalms before taking to bed, intending to pen the letter in the morning. During the night, I dreamed of Tom Chaney and awoke with satisfaction that he was dead.


	2. Mr LaBoeuf

"There's a delivery for you down at the station, LaBoeuf." The gray-haired man looked up from his pipe and wondered at the look of amusement on his old friend's face.

"Couldn't you have brought it here?" These days, he liked to stay in his barn with his horses, Jack and Millie, and his pig, DeCourcy. He would not go into town without the most important of reasons.

"It's too big for that—needs a wagon." LaBoeuf began to wonder at Morgan's sanity.

"What is it, then? More mattress stuffing from my fool sister?"

"Nope, ain't nothing like that. You gotta come and see."

With a shake of the head, LaBoeuf tipped his cigar ash onto the barn floor and got to his feet. "This had better be worth the trouble."

Morgan didn't say a single word the whole way into town, for once. LaBoeuf was glad of the silence, but he couldn't understand why his friend had picked this one time to be quiet or why he kept looking over at him and laughing. He'd better tell Mabel, he figured. Maybe Morgan had been into the whiskey again.

"It's inside, waiting for you," Morgan finally said in a funny, strangled voice as LaBoeuf pulled the wagon up to the train depot. Wordlessly, he threw the reigns to his friend and jumped to the ground, proud of the fact that he felt no pain in spite of his age and years of hard work.

He wondered if he were imagining the strange looks that greeted him instead of the usual pleasantries as he came to the entrance of the station and opened the large wooden door. Inside, he saw a group of people clustered around something he couldn't see.

"…and I assure you, Mr. LaBoeuf will see to it." The voice was unmistakable, both in tone and timbre. He pushed through the crowd.

Mattie Ross stood beside the stationmaster's desk, wearing a black coat. Her hair was not plaited; it was twisted atop her head. "Miss Ross." He had no idea what else to say.

"Good afternoon, Mr. LaBoeuf." She smiled. "Please inform these people that we are to be married. I believe they think I am untruthful."

LaBoeuf stared at her a moment, but it was not a very long one. "Miss Ross and I are engaged," he heard himself utter, "and furthermore, we are on our way to be married this afternoon." He held out an arm, and Mattie took it determinedly. He wondered if he should tell her he was pleased to see her, but of course, she already knew.

"I hope that my present course of action is as desirable to you as it is to me." She spoke quietly, for his ears only, and her voice was confident, but even so, he felt the tiniest tremble in the hand that rested on his arm, and he knew that he held the fate of her happiness. It was a strange thing, to finally have the power over Mattie Ross that he'd wanted at the very beginning.

"I assure you, ma'am, that I consider myself a fortunate man." Her relieved sigh was nearly imperceptible, and she did not pull away when he placed his hand atop hers. He thought that he would like to place his arm around her waist, but he would not dare to do so until after the service.


	3. Marrying

It is a strange thing. I never had time to marry anyone else, but when it came to marrying Mr. LaBoeuf, I found that I had time aplenty.


End file.
